Orono

Palm trees, the smell of coconut oil and a nice loose fitting, comfy shirt. You must be talking about Tommy Bahama! While the company may have a tropical sounding name, its roots are deep here in the tundra of Minnesota!

Multiple agencies responded Friday night to a two-alarm house fire in Orono. Officials say the blaze broke out at a home on the 130 block of Luce Line Ridge. No one was home when five different fire departments arrived at the scene.

It’s poised to be an intense and emotional week in St. Paul and around the Twin Cities as the best boys hockey teams in the state hit Xcel Energy Center for one of the best state tournaments around. That, and state tournament bids get handed out for next week’s boys state basketball tournament at Target Center.

Authorities say there were no injuries but an Orono home is a total loss after a house fire Tuesday night. Crew were called to a house fire on the 3200 block of Casco Circle after a caller reported flames shooting about 30 to 40 feet high from the home.

A Wayzata couple has been taken to jail to serve a yearlong sentence for theft that prosecutors say led to a bank’s failure. A Hennepin County judge this week sentenced Philip and Virginia Carlson to 21 months in prison. The couple will not have to serve prison time if they remain law-abiding. Judge Lois Conroy also ordered the Carlsons to serve a year in the workhouse.

We’ve heard the saying “It takes a village.” That is especially true when it comes to making sure kids have a good education. That’s why this week’s Excellent Educator is not a teacher, not a principal but a custodian who is described as the backbone of Orono High School.

Officials with the Orono School District said a handwritten note containing a bomb threat was found at about 8 a.m. Tuesday on the property of Orono Middle School. Students were sent home for the day at about 11:30 a.m.

We’ve arrived at the final weekend of the summer, but high school football is just heating up. David McCoy reported on the featured game — Hutchinson Vs. Orono — while Mike Max and Frank Vascellaro highlighted the best plays from other games.

There’s a huge match-up west of the Twin Cities Friday night that has Wright County Conference title implications later this year as Orono hosts Hutchinson. Both teams are unbeaten at 3-0, and the Spartans are ranked No. 5 in Class 4A, while the Tigers are the top-ranked team and the defending state champions.

One of the two men killed in Friday’s head-on crash near Orono has been identified. According to the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s office, 50-year-old Steve Francis Crowley of Delano was driving one of the vehicles involved in the fatal accident, which occurred just before 7 a.m. on Highway 12 near County Road 6. The name of the other victim has not yet been released.

Hennepin County authorities are investigating a head-on crash that killed two people Friday morning near Orono. It happened on Highway 12 west of County Road 6 just before 7 a.m. Orono Deputy Police Chief Chris Fischer says one driver was dead at the scene, and the other died later.

When the puck drops Wednesday morning at Xcel Energy Center, it’ll mark one of the most exciting and entertaining weeks of state tournament action. Between two classes, 16 of the top boys high school hockey teams in Minnesota will converge on St. Paul this week.

In Minnesota, there’s nothing like the atmosphere, excitement and pressure of high school playoff hockey. That is, unless, you’re Orono’s David McCuskey. In his high school hockey postseason career, McCuskey is averaging three goals a game. He’s only played one, but it was a good one. “I just really like to win. I guess I’m pretty competitive out there,” McCuskey said.

Dr. Stephen Larson is being remembered by his patients, after being shot to death inside his home Friday night in Orono. According to the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office, police were called to the home on the 1000 block of Heritage Road just before 9 p.m., where they found a man in the front of the property with a handgun.

Family and friends are in shock after a prominent Twin Cities doctor was gunned down in his home in Orono Friday night. According to the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office, police were called to a home on the 1000 block of Heritage Road just before 9 p.m., where they found a man in the front of the property with a handgun. Authorities said shots were exchanged and police killed the man. Law enforcement searched the house and found another man, later identified as Dr. Stephen Larson, dead from an apparent gunshot wound. Larson was a well-known physician who delivered thousands of babies in his career.

Next month, a school district here in Minnesota will be honored in Washington D.C. for its unique approach to education. Orono’s school district is one of three in the country to be named one of the National Schools of Character. It’s the first public school district in Minnesota to get the award. The character-focused education program was implemented several years ago. Since then, school leaders have seen the number of referrals, detentions and suspensions drop by two-thirds.

We’re now two games in for every team, and for some teams it’s three games. By now, most teams have a sense of what they can do and what their identity is. Now it’s just a matter of implementing that every week against the opponent.

Maple Plain camper Arville Halvorson loves being in the outdoors with his family. But poison ivy is certainly not a treasured part of this pastime. “Scratchy, itchy, stingy pain. I don’t want it,” Halvorson said. But it seems people around the metro are getting it, according to Dr. April Farrell of Doctor’s Skin Care in Orono. “We’ve been seeing a lot of that in our clinic this summer. Kind of speculating that the weather we had this spring – with all the rain and then the heat – has possibly led to some different growth patterns and increased exposure for people,” Dr. Farrell said.